PUDUKKOTTAI: When Cyclone Gaja swept through Pudukkottai district a month ago, M S Govindarajan (60) had only one concern in his mind - protecting the archives of his monthly hand-written journal, Thazhampoo, that he had been publishing for 40 years.
Govindarajan is a Siddha medical practitioner by profession at his small village of Vijayapuram near Aranthangi. His ancestors were also Siddha practitioners. When he was studying at a college in Pudukkottai, he happened to thumb through a hand-written journal at a private library in Karaikudi in 1977.
That journal inspired him to publish his own hand-written one. When he was thinking of a name for it, a song from Thazhampoo, an MGR-starrer, wafted across the airwaves. At once, he decided to name his journal Thazhampoo.
The first issue of Thazhampoo came out in November 1977, when Govindarajan was 20-years-old. That issue had only three copies with eight pages each. As he himself was a diploma holder in a drawing, he drew the picture of Bruce Lee on the cover. He kept one copy with him, sent one to a library and another to a Tamil Radio station in the Philippines.
In the subsequent months, he sent his journal to various radio stations. A few announcers read poems from it with the mention of the journal’s name and publishing address. This earned him readers across the world, including Malaysia and Sri Lanka. He also started receiving letters of appreciations from the Tamil diaspora.
In the initial period, the journal had eight pages, and later, it increased to 16. It then rose to 20 and presently has 32 pages. Govindarajan said, “For many years, I used a ball-point pen to write and carbon papers to make copies. When the number of copies increased to 20, I had to write the same contents seven times using two carbon papers. With this, each time I could make three copies. But for the journal’s cover, I had to colour the cover-picture on all the copies one by one.”
He could take a breather after the arrival of photocopy machines in the early 1990s in Tiruchy. He wrote only one copy and brought it to Tiruchy to take photocopies. After some years, the photocopy facility was available at Pudukkottai town for him to take copies of the journal. On knowing about his efforts, Gunalakshmi of Chennai donated `15,000, with which he bought a new photocopy machine in June 2017. Now he takes photocopies on his own.
His journal consists of short stories, essays, riddles, poems, snippets, jokes, book reviews and interviews among others. He also interviewed actresses including Meena, Vichithra, Yuvarani when their important films came out.
Sharing his interviewing experiences, Govindarajan said, “With only the residential addresses of actresses in hand, I would board buses from Pudukkottai to Chennai. There, I took autorickshaws to reach their houses. Sometimes I would wait for hours and introduce myself by handing the journal to them. They were surprised on seeing the hand-written journals and appreciated me.” Presently, he publishes 110 copies of his journal with 40 copies sent to subscribers. The rest, he sends to writers, to those who publish small journals in the state, and also to his friends whenever he meets them.
One of his subscribers, Anish Kumar, an English teacher in the Bharathidasan University College, Perambalur, said, “I happened to see Thazhampoo at a writer’s house 15 years ago. Since then, I have been reading this. Sometimes, I also contribute articles.” Shenbagarajan, who publishes ‘Neela Nila’, a quarterly literary journal from Virudhunagar, said, “I like to read the book reviews from Thazhampoo. I even bought some books after reading his reviews. He is good at reviewing books.”
In another memorable incident, he sent journals with poems praising former chief minister J Jayalalithaa to her address in 2009 and 2011. To his surprise, he received a letter of thanks from her.
Talking about the recent Cyclone Gaja, Govindarajan, a resident of one of the affected villages, said, “I preserved all my journals, from the first copy till the latest one, in almirahs at my tiled-roof house. On that night, heavy winds removed some tiles on the roof, making way for rainwater to seep in. I covered the almirahs with flex banners to protect the journals from getting damaged.”